Quarterly Progress Report: January-March--2008 - Police Reform ...

Committed to PEOPLE'S RIGHT TO KNOWSunday, April 6, 2008 03:33 PM GMT+06:00Published On: 2008-03-31Click here for Printer Friendly Version'Change draft ordn to make policepeople-friendly'Our Correspondent, SatkhiraNationalSpeakers at a workshop yesterday urged the government to either drop orchange a few 'not pro-people' sections of the recently prepared draft policeordinance.Satkhira district police organised the district community consultation on DraftPolice Ordinance 2007 on the premises of Satkhira Police Lines.The draft ordinance aims at creating an environment to help police workindependently, Khulna Range DIG Md Asaduzzaman Mia said.A few other speakers, however, feared that some sections of the draft ordinancemight pose threats to democratic rights of people.They referred to section 138, 144 and 145.Section 138 says that if an allegation against any police personnel is provedfalse then the complainant would be given three months' imprisonment or Tk20,000 fine or both.This would discourage people from making any complaint, they said.Section144 of the draft exempts a police official of any type of punishments for'performing duty on good faith' but the term 'in good faith' has not beendefined.Section 145 does not allow any legal action against any police official. Thissection said that the report has to be made with previous permission from agovernment-authorised officer. They urged the government to omit or changethese sections.They also urged the government to increase facilities including salary of policepersonnel to keep the law enforcers free from corruption.Among others, former minister Dr Aftabuzzaman, Additional DeputyCommissioner MA Aziz, Civil Surgeon Dr Abu Aziz Al Monsur, PourasavaChairman Sheikh Ashraful Haque, Satkhira District Bar Association PresidentShah Alam and Prof Abu Ahmed spoke at the meeting presided over by SatkhiraSuperintendent of Police Mirza Abdullahel Baki.